I’ve longed believed season 3 through 6 were the sweet spot
of Newhart. Those seasons have some of my favorite
episodes of the show period (yes, even better than the famous season finale in
my opinion). That’s not to say that I
don’t enjoy some of the episodes from season 7, something that was confirmed
for me as I watched the recent DVD release of the show.

The setup of the show is the same as it has been for
years. Dick and Joanna Loudon (Bob
Newhart and Mary Frann) own and run the Stratford Inn, a bed and breakfast in
Vermont. Naturally, they have two
employees, George Utley (Tom Poston), who has been the handyman at the inn all
his life, upholding a long family tradition, and Stephanie Vanderkellen (Julia
Duffy) a spoiled rich girl who has been forced to become a maid. In addition to running the inn, Dick also
writes how to books and hosts a weekly TV talk show at the local television
station. His producer on the show,
yuppie Michael Harris (Peter Scolari), is also Stephanie’s boyfriend. While these are the five main characters, we
also regularly see Larry, his brother Darryl, and his other brother Darryl
(William Sanderson, Tony Papenfuss, and John Voldstad). These backwoodsmen also run the Minute Man
Café next door.

Over the course of these 22 episodes, Stephanie winds up
with appendicitis and gets blood from the last person she wants. Joanna starts a new career as a realtor. The love of George’s life, a former maid at
the inn, shows up again. Larry and the
Darryls throw a surprising dinner party.
And in one of my favorite episodes, Dick tries his hand at fiction
writing with a murder mystery with thinly disguised characters based on all the
people in his life.

This season actually introduces a story arc for the first
time in the show. Early in the season,
Michael loses his job at the TV station and spends time trying out various
careers before winding up in the mental institution. Meanwhile, he breaks up with Stephanie to
protect her from having to deal with what he is facing. Naturally, we gets episodes that focus on
this and some that spring off this while others completely ignore it with
Michael just having a couple of scenes.

And, honestly, this is one of the things that hurts the show
this season. The story arc itself is
very uneven. Some of the episodes are
actually pretty funny; others border on the painful. It does provide a bit of interesting growth
for the characters, although I’m not sure it was worth it. Then again, this arc does give us “A Message
from Michael,” which is one of my favorite episodes of the season.

Not that all the bad episodes of the season are related to this
arc. For example “The Nice Man Cometh”
is absolutely painful as Dick becomes a nightly target for an insult comic,
with the rest of the town getting into the act.
Seriously, this episode is painful to watch and there is nothing funny
about it.

The uneven nature of the humor is coupled with the
characters going over the top, something they’ve been flirting with for a
couple of seasons now. This is most
notable with Michael, whose use of alliteration and cutesy nicknames finally
crosses a line at times. Again, at times
it is fun and other times it is overbearing.

Because this season isn’t as strong as the last four, the
flaws are more pronounced. However,
there are still plenty of laughs in this season. And we do love these characters, so it’s hard
not to enjoy spending time with them.

The acting is still fine.
Yes, there is some overacting in a few episodes, but it feels like the
acting is following the writing and not the other way around. Kathy Kinney shows up as Miss Goddard for the
first time in this season, which surprised me.
I was thinking she was a season 8 invention. Her character isn’t too bad yet. I definitely didn’t care for some of her
episodes next season.

This DVD set features all 22 episodes in full frame and
stereo sound. The picture isn’t the best
quality all the time, but they are watchable.
We don’t get any extras, but we haven’t since season 1, so that’s no
surprise.

While the glory days of Newhart
was clearly behind it, there are still plenty of laughs in season 7. Pop this in with the proper expectations and
you’ll find yourself entertained.

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